Nate Quarter's fourth descending expedition
The Fourth Descent of Nate Quarter and Ambris Hentadile began in c.605 and finished in c.619 when Nate returned to New Sanctaphrax. Events Before the descent began, Nate realised he had given his spyglass to Eudoxia Prade, however he did not have time to retrieve it before the descent. When the descent began, the first few days consisted of many long drops which took about a day to complete. During these drops, glisters caused delusions, though the descenders were protected by sleep-hoods. Nate's vent became loose in his sleep-hood, causing his mind to become taken to the descenders who had died on previous descents, however Abris realised before this became fatal. The descenders managed the Cusp without much difficulty. On the fourth day, the descenders encountered 'cliff haze', which was incredibly disorientating. This made them have to speed up and attracted Edge wraiths, who saw the light of Nate's Phraxchamber. One Edge wraith spat venom onto Nate's arm, and Ambris fired a dart to remove it and the pair decided to continue the descent in darkness. After, they reached some ravine demons, which they also shot with a dart and had to perform a couple of dead drops to avoid the larger creatures. They then found some Descenders' marks from Tulkhusk informing them of where the Edge wraiths and ravine demons were, making Ambris and Nate decide to do Rapid Descent down the cliff. Later the Edge wraiths managed to find them and the darkness was no longer advantageous to them. They decided to risk their chances with the ravine demons, however these were also problematic to them. In the end, they decided, as much as Ambris hated the idea, to strap their phraxpacks together and freefall. When the freefall finished, both Ambris and Nate were alive, however Nate's body ached and both of Ambris's legs were broken. Despite this they felt exceptionally luck to not smash against the wall of the Edge as their phraxchambers stopped working after they landed, but Nate did feel like the descent was a waste as he didn't feel it was was true descending was freefall. They found themselves in a scree field, which had cushioned their fall. Nate made his friend more comfortable, and then he started to make a calendar of the time they would spend in this place. In the first week, they developed simple survival techniques and Nate began to explore the area, which he found to contain little life. As they continued to live there, they talked less and less and after six months, when they ran out of food, they began to experiment on suitable vegetation to eat and when they found out suitable food, Nate would forage. Although this kept them surviving, the meaning of time, consciousness and even life seemed to vanish, and they both became haunted by nightmares. Finally, when they had no idea of what age they were, Ambris saw a giant rock floating upwards, very like the ones that came over the Edge mysteriously. As Nate had more strength than Ambris, they decided he put his rock spike into the rock and so returned to New Sanctaphrax. Category:Third Age of Flight Category:Descents Category:Events